


I'm Done With Having Dreams

by lurkinglurkerwholurks



Series: The Last of the Real Ones [4]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU, World's Finest (Comics)
Genre: Big man blushing, Bromance, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, Switching from last name to first name as a code for emotional intimacy, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:07:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23350681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lurkinglurkerwholurks/pseuds/lurkinglurkerwholurks
Summary: The nightmare was not a new one. Far from it, the dream and its terror were old, the oldest he could recall.
Relationships: Clark Kent & Bruce Wayne
Series: The Last of the Real Ones [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1447024
Comments: 47
Kudos: 323





	I'm Done With Having Dreams

**Author's Note:**

> Inspiration: https://billyarrowsmith.tumblr.com/post/154993803913/this-is-such-a-beautiful-take-on-the-parallel

The nightmare was not a new one. Far from it, the dream and its terror were old, the oldest he could recall.

It would start in different ways—with a mundane day, with a trip to the store, with a half-remembered conversation, with a different memory entirely. There were a thousand beginnings, but only one ending. Somewhere in the middle, the scene would shift, wiping away sunlight and laughter and normalcy.

No matter where he started, he would look up to find himself standing in a rain-drenched alley, the dirty asphalt glinting in the dim and flickering streetlight. There would be a roar like thunder, like the ear-punching pop of firecrackers. Sometimes there would be a scream—his own—and then the bouncing clatter of pearls.

No matter how the dream began, it ended with his parents’ sightless eyes staring past him and their bodies crumpled on the ground like broken marionettes.

As a child, Bruce had lost count of how many times he had woken in tears, screaming for the dead. But he had grown, moved on, he thought, to newer, fresher terrors. He was tall now, nearly as large as his own father, and more prepared, more determined to never suffer another night like that one.

Maybe that was why tonight the nightmare took him out with the ferocity of a baseball bat to the back of the knees.

It was like getting tossed by a wave, coming back to consciousness. There was the confusion of Where am I? What happened? Mom?, the gradual reorientation of linens against clenched fists instead of the hard bite of asphalt, and the reacquaintance of an adult man’s frame instead of a little boy’s trembling limbs.

He was not there, screaming in the dark.

He was safe.

It was just a dream... But also not just a dream.

They were dead, still dead, had been dead for decades.

Bruce pressed his face into his pillow and wept.

He was nearly silent at first, the suffocating weave of the pillowcase soaking up what little noise his training failed to contain. But the pillow didn’t smell like Alfred’s detergent, and with awareness came the memory of the case that had taken him out of Gotham to this mediocre motel.

So he wept, not as loudly as he could have, since years of training and embarrassment rested warning fingertips on his lips, but not as quietly as he could have either.

He cried until he felt emptied, like a jack-o-lantern roughly carved of its insides and scooped hollow. It was not the end of mourning—it was never the end—but he had no more tears left to wring free at present. But neither could he sleep.

There was a small park nearby, ten minutes’ brisk walk, perhaps. Bruce’s habit wasn’t to find solace in nature, but barring the presence of Alfred, he couldn’t bear the company of people in the fractured wake of a dream. They demanded too much of him just when he had nothing to give. Nor could he concentrate on his work just now, with every tendril of thought flinching back from reality like a hand from stinging nettles. So he put on his battered trenchcoat over his sweats, tied on a pair of trainers, and walked to the park.

The little town was unlike Gotham, with buildings that stopped abruptly after four or five stories and streets that settled sleepily after midnight. There were no other late night wanderers to bother him, and now, deep into the dog watch, even the disenfranchised who haunted the parks had tucked themselves into whatever little nooks they called home.

Bruce was utterly alone, up until when he wasn’t.

“You had better come out,” he told the trees.

Clark at least had the decency to look sheepish, if unrepentant, as he stepped out of the shadows and joined Bruce on the walking path.

“How did you know?” Clark asked as he drew close.

“I just did.” Bruce spent a good portion of his life in the shadows. After a while, you got to know what they were supposed to feel like.

“And people say I’m spooky.” Clark huffed a laugh.

“No one calls you spooky.”

Clark was the opposite of spooky. He was too soft, too bright, too... nice. It would be like calling a sunbeam spooky.

“Unnatural, then,” Clark adjusted.

“Why are you here?”

The words were out nearly before the other man had finished speaking. Bruce’s pulse was a low thrum in the base of his throat. What disaster had brought Superman out to this little backwoods town in the dead of night?

Clark Kent might play the country bumpkin, but he was rarely caught off-guard. The doe eyes and aw-shucks demeanor masked a finely honed mind. So when Clark hesitated instead of answering readily, Bruce’s eyes narrowed.

“I thought it had been a while and wanted to visit?” Clark offered, his pitch rising weakly at the end.

They had been standing shoulder to shoulder, angled out to face the path before them, but Bruce turned and faced Clark fully now. “What’s wrong?”

Clark blinked, eyelashes fluttering like an assault behind his lenses. “Nothing. Nothing’s—”

“Did the others send you?”

“No—”

“Does Gotham need me?”

“Gotham’s fine, Br—”

“Did someone die?”

He should have asked that one first, but he could still see his dream against his eyelids with every blink and his throat was still raw. He hadn’t wanted to ask. Just speaking the words aloud made his pulse twitch.

“No.” Clark’s brows had pulled together. “Gosh, Bruce, I—No. No, everyone’s fine.”

“Then why are you here?” Bruce felt like a spring wound too tightly. On this night, with a pillow still damp with tears, the tension was unbearable.

Clark shrugged, oxen shoulders lifting and falling again as he ducked his head. “You were the only one awake. I thought you could use some company.”

Bruce’s frown deepened. When had he shown a need for company? Ever? But they were standing alone in an empty downtown park in the dog watch of the night, hundreds of miles from Gotham or Metropolis, and Clark wouldn’t look him in the eye.

Clark wouldn’t look him in the eye.

“You were listening.”

The realization bit into him, first with a sharp, clean shock, and then with brutish, stinging pain. Bruce had allowed himself to weep because he had thought he was safe, that he’d been in private, but Clark had been _listening_.

He was going to break his hand on Clark’s perfect face.

“Bruce—”

Bruce threw up a hand, not to strike Clark but to cut him off, though it was a near thing. He hadn’t let anyone hear his nightmares since he was a boy. Even in the heat of battle, he choked down cries of pain until he was safe and alone.

“You had _no right._ ”

This, this casual abuse of power, this was what had worried him about Superman. When crossing the line was so _easy_ , how could he trust a man not to give in to his lesser self?

Clark had a trick of shrinking himself, of pulling in his shoulders and hunching his back to reduce himself and seem less of a threat. He was doing it now, as if looking up at Bruce through his lenses could make him seem like Dick charming his way out of a misstep.

“Bruce, please.”

Bruce was angry. He was _so_ angry, and he knew Clark could hear his rage in the galloping of his pulse, the drumming of his heart. But the hollow in his chest was filling with saltwater, his throat aching at the brim with sorrow. He had trusted Clark.

“You spy on me often, then?” Bruce sneered. He was still facing Clark but couldn’t bear to look the other man in the face. His gaze was above the shoulder, shooting off into the night at shifting shadows from clouds passing across the moon.

“No.” Clark’s voice was low, but steady. Bruce risked a look. Clark was staring down at his shoes.

“Just bored tonight? Decided to flip to Channel Bruce to see if there was something to giggle about?”

God, he was being nasty. He knew it, could feel it in the way the spite in his tone coated his tongue, but he couldn’t help it. He was wounded, lashing out with claws unsheathed.

“No.”

He needed to leave. He needed to go before the lock was off his tongue entirely. He would deal with Clark later, when he could hide behind his cowl and could no longer feel the dried salt on his face.

Bruce turned and stalked down the path, leaving Clark behind. He was only just slow enough to hear Clark’s murmur.

“You were the only one awake.”

Bruce had stormed so far down the path that Clark was nothing but a blur against the fields when his brain finally made the connection. His step hitched, then he stopped walking entirely.

_Idiot._

He only hoped the turmoil of the last hour was enough of an excuse for being so dense.

Clark was still standing where Bruce had left him, shoulders hunched, broad hands shoved tightly into his jean pockets. Bruce didn’t return the full distance, choosing instead to stop several yards away. Clark would have no difficulty hearing him, after all.

“Why were you awake, Kent.” It wasn’t a question so much as a two-fingered prod to the ribs.

Even in the dark, the tips of Clark’s ears flushed red. He didn’t look up.

“Clark.” Bruce waited until Clark lifted his head, the moonlight rimming his lenses silver.

“Krypton?” Bruce guessed, quietly.

Clark swallowed, then nodded. “Among other things. I only remember pieces, so mostly it’s... yeah, other things.”

Bruce waited, certain that wasn’t all.

“I...” Clark sighed heavily, broad chest heaving, then angled away from Bruce to look out over the park. “It helps to listen. I swear I don’t stick around if there’s anything to hear.”

He had taken his hands out of his pockets and begun to fidget, agile typist fingers picking at each other like birds. “I just listen to heartbeats, that’s all. It, it helps, knowing everyone’s okay.”

And in trying to calm himself, Clark had stumbled into the aftermath of Bruce’s own nightmare. Bruce wasn’t sure if Clark had come to comfort him or had needed to see for himself that Bruce was okay. In the end, it didn’t matter much.

Bruce sighed, shoulders relaxing from a fighter’s tension as his anger began to slough away. “I’m okay,” he assured.

“I know,” Clark mumbled.

And he likely did, cognitively. But the emotional toll of a nightmare would continue to warp long after the dream ended. Bruce knew that all too well.

Bruce chewed on the inside of his cheek for a moment before offering, “Parents.”

Clark’s eyes softened with understanding.

“I’ll survive.” And he would. He always did. That was part of the nightmare.

“I really... truly am sorry, Bruce. I gave you my word, and I broke it. That’s inexcusable.”

Bruce grunted and tried to marshal his words. He couldn’t say it was okay; it wasn’t. But neither could he pretend not to understand.

“Next time,” he said at last, “just call.”

“But if you’re sleeping—”

“Clark,” Bruce interrupted gently, “just call.”

The farmboy flush was creeping back up Clark’s neck as he ducked his head and nodded. “Alright. Thanks, Bruce.”

Bruce flicked his gaze past Clark toward the entrance of the park. “I think I passed a diner on the way here.”

“Oh, no, you should get some rest. I’m—”

“Clark.”

Bruce was already striding back down the path, Clark at his side. His companion gave an aw-shucks shrug.

“Alright, Bruce. Alright. Thanks.”

Bruce flicked his eyes in a halfway roll. "I'm not doing it for you. I want a milkshake."

There was warmth against his shoulder as Clark knocked against him and the warmth echoed deep in his gut. He still couldn't bear the company of others while struggling out of the thrall of a dream, and that would never change, but a good best friend didn't count as "people." He was glad he had his.

**Author's Note:**

> "I'm done with having dreams  
> The thing that I believe  
> Oh, you drain all the fear from me"  
> —The Last of the Real Ones, Fall Out Boy
> 
> Sixty-one works in and I still have no idea how to end a fic.


End file.
